Allamuchy (Deer Park) Trail Maint. this Saturday July 15th

Member

Greetings,
Allamuchy Deer Park maintenance this Saturday July 15th between 8:30 - 12:30PM.
We will be parking at the parking lot at the end of Deer Park Road off 517.
40.887636, -74.814156
We will be doing a 'brush back' of overgrowth.
Please bring water, bug spray and work gloves if you have them.
There will be bagels for those who RSVP (so we know how many tools to bring).
RSVP: allamuchy@jorba.org
Please check here for trail maint. news and cancellations due to weather: https://www.facebook.com/allamuchytrailcrew/
or call Marc 201-650-3176
Thanks in advance for your support!
Best regards,
Marc
Marc Perezperez@jorba.orgwww.JORBA.org
201-650-3176

Well-Known Member

Up until now, I have not given the old Irish Guilt Trip that my extended family has taught me so well.

Deer Park is a great park that allows many entry level/intermediate riders to get a real sense of true single track mountain biking without the heavy burden of endless climbing and rocks as some of the other local parks have. For those more seasoned, this is a great park to start and end on a double or triple park ride.

There are just a few of us locals who have been trying to keep up with the trail maintenance over the last few years....most of which with our own tools. The local JORBA chapter has had it's hands full with maintaining the much larger Allamuchy North system, which has led to less time allocated to Deer Park. As you can understand, this is a tremendous amount of work.

If you have had the pleasure of riding this trail system over the years, please try and join us for this Saturday's TM session. I can think of a dozen or more people off the top of my head, but will refrain from calling them out. The more help we get, the more trails we can open back up again!!!

Well-Known Member

Update: We had five (5) volunteers come out on Saturday to help knock back some of the heavy overgrowth within Deer Park. With the limited number of people, we focused our attention on the most critical areas. We broke up into groups to tackle these areas.

1. The Red Trail along the lake. There is a section of this trail that has been a nuisance with overgrowth year after year....approximately 50 yards from the Blue Trail intersection. This specific area took almost 2 hours alone to clear back enough so we don't have to touch it for a few more years. Unfortunately, we simply ran out of time and were only able to get about 1/3 of the total trail (along the lake) completed.

2. The White Trail: We focused on the area from the bottom of the Deer Path Tech DH back up to the fire road. There was only one person on this section so they focused on knocking down the overgrowth and weren't able to finish clearing the cut debris from the actual trails. Be careful as there may be some barberry branches still in the actual trail.

3. The White from the main parking lot UP towards the left. This trail wasn't finished either as it is quite overgrown AND a tree had knocked down live power lines that were still there; approx 3/4 of the way to the top. JCP&L actually rolled up as we were finishing up. They didn't seem all that happy as this was a serious trek into the woods to address these lines.

4. Nine (9) downed trees were cleared from the trails. This constitutes the majority of them, but there are still a few more that need to be cleaned up.

JORBA is working on scheduling another TM session in the near future. It would be great if we can see a bigger turnout next time. More help means more work to be completed with the ultimate goal of allowing all of us to enjoy these trails without having bloody arms or having to stop to climb over downed trees.